I decided to find out at a local dealership. Hummers, the salesman says, sell themselves—"[They say] ‘I can afford an 8,000-pound recreational Ferrari, and you can't.'" It's this image that SUV automakers have capitalized on all along. In 2003's best-selling High and Mighty, Keith Bradsher says market researchers found SUV drivers to be insecure and vain—and the bigger the SUV, the more insecure and vain the driver.
Researchers also said SUV drivers lack confidence in their driving skills.
I'm certainly feeling this lack of confidence when I jump (literally) into the driver's seat. I anxiously look over at the salesman, awaiting instructions. He is very, very far away in the passenger seat. The console is so large that we could play Monopoly on it—if I wasn't so preoccupied with how I am going to maneuver a war machine through the streets on a Friday afternoon.
I turn over the beastly engine and take off. I feel like I'm riding a bull in a passenger-car shop. The fatality rate for drivers of passenger cars struck by trucks like this is four times greater than vice-versa. Remembering this factoid, I drive apologetically.
Meanwhile, the salesman is explaining that the H1 is meant for off-roading, not, um, on-roading.
And it shows. The H1 (7,847 pounds, 8 miles per gallon) lurches, has slow pick-up and rocks back and forth upon stopping. Next, I try the H2 (6,400 pounds 11 mpg) and the H3 (4,700 pounds and 15 mpg). The H2 is comparable in size and environmental impact to the Ford Expedition (5,799 pounds, 14 city mpg), Chevy Suburban (5,607 pounds, 14 mpg) and Cadillac Escalade (5,814 pounds, 14 city mpg). The H3 is comparable to the smaller SUVs.
In comparison, a Toyota Corolla weighs 2,844 pounds and gets 32 mpg. A Honda Civic, 2,886 pounds and 32 mpg. Neither can tow a 300-foot yacht.
By the H3, I'm wondering how I might feel if I never had that environmental science 101 class in college. If I didn't know, or care to consider, the consequences of my actions, would I enjoy the tiny steering wheel, the spacious console and the signal to other drivers that I had arrived? Not just to the red light, but in life?
The H2 and H3 are much friendlier vehicles, and the salesman tells me they have major "mom appeal" because of the their safety.
But SUVs have an eight percent higher occupant fatality rate than cars. Rollovers account for 62 percent of SUV deaths.
Although the salesmen insist that the Hummer's appeal is its off-roading abilities, I'm lucky to find a few owners Saturday afternoon packing their trucks with groceries at a Summerlin shopping center—in a parking lot, not off-road.
But Angela and Kevin Hanneman got their H3 almost a year ago and say they have indeed off-roaded. They traded in their Nissan Xterra for the H3 because they liked the brand and could now afford it.
Another Hummer driver, Heather Aaron, got the H2 because she likes big trucks. Simple enough. So does she off-road?
"It's too expensive to go off-roading in," she says. She later rolls through a stop sign and almost runs me over while I'm crossing the parking lot; I'm thinking she might want to give off-roading a try.
Aaron Jones owns one of 25 H6s in the world, a customized H2 with 48 inches added to the rear, meaning six total tires are needed. He chose the H6 as the perfect vehicle to promote his gym.
"People recognize it. It's excessive. And that's what Vegas is all about—shallow losers," the Vegas resident says.
Jones laughs when I ask about the environment, and he tells me if he thought not driving a Hummer would save the planet, he'd drive the H6 into a wall.
This is about when I realize that my disdain of Hummer owners is proportionately related to the size of their vehicle.
Because, come on, does the size of their tank really assuage their insecurity in their driving skills, in addition to solidifying their social status?
But then, is it really productive of me to smugly hate on Hummer owners?
I guess in the end, our reactions to this outrageous vehicle send the same message to each other: "I'm above you." For Hummer owners, the meaning is literal ... for environmentalists, it's figurative.